On Friday, May 31, at 11.00, Robert Freidin (Princeton University) will give a talk on "Anaphoric interpretation under minimalist assumptions".
Abstract: The minimalist program in generative grammar, which has been investigated over the past two decades, has significant unexplored ramifications for the grammatical account of anaphoric interpretation. This talk reviews the major assumptions of the minimalist program and develops a rather different view (compared to current proposals under minimalism) of what they suggest for a grammatical account of anaphoric relations. On the empirical side, it will concern the interpretation of ellipsis constructions that involve anaphora as in (i)
(i) John loves his dog and Bill does too.
where two distinct interpretations are possible. Ultimately this talk will consider uncoupling anaphoric relations from the concept of reference to which they have been tied since the beginnings of modern generative grammar.
The meeting place will be room 4.3, 4th floor, Josep Carner building, UB. The talk is open to the public so feel free to attend and inform anyone interested!